Tuesday, 18 June 2013

Before finally upgrading to a
smartphone last year, the photographer in me always thought it would be cool to
have a camera phone. But then I got my BlackBerry, and I realised…well, I realised
that the images are just a bit shit – especially when you zoom in. There's no
optical zoom, just a digital option which crops the final file and adds a lot
of noise. Add to that no control of exposure and the difficulty of actually taking
and framing images on the phone, and the whole thing began to seem rather
pointless. But then, one day a few weeks ago, I was bored and waiting for my
girlfriend to finish picking something up from her office. So I started taking
some photos. The images weren't very good, but there was something about these two
pictures which struck me:

Somewhere, in among the blur
and the grain, there was a kind of beauty. The noise in the images reminded me
of the brushstrokes of the impressionist painters. When I was a kid, I told my
parents that I didn't like impressionism because the images were 'scruffy'. It
was this 'scruffiness' that I was now responding to in these two photographs.

With this in mind, I decided
to embark on a photography project. A series of photographs taken on my
BlackBerry, on full zoom, highlighting the 'impressionism' (the 'scruffiness') of the images
generated. What follows below is the result of this project.

Monday, 17 June 2013

(Click
here to read my general introduction to the 'Films This Week' series of
posts.)

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Before Midnight

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10/06/13

Watched a double bill of Before
Sunriseand Before
Sunset. Their beautiful perfection puts my own work to shame.

12/06/13

Went to the BFI to see a
collection of Thanhouser's Early Cinema Adaptations. I guess the emphasis is
on early (they spanned 1910-1913). I really liked two of the five they showed.
It was a good evening too – there was a Q&A and introductions to each film.
Glad I managed to make it along.

14/06/13

Saw Before Midnight. I'm not
sure if it was quite everything I wanted, but I still loved it. It was just a
little different from what I was expecting. Maybe expecting isn't the right
word – I'm not sure what I was expecting – I just mean that it feels different
from the other two. If anything, it almost feels closer to Slacker and Waking Life in
its freewheeling conversations (at least in the first half – the second half
reminded me more of Tape, at least in
setting). More than anything, what struck me was the sense of being reunited with
old-friends – which is testament to how well Linklater, Delpy and Hawke have
crafted their characters. It's also very funny. Perhaps the funniest of the
three. Looking at them as a trilogy, it's interesting to note how they get more
sexually explicit as the trilogy progress – and therefore as the actors get
older. It feels like the reverse of what you'd expect in more conventional
filmmaking. There's a sense of magic and mystery in the first two which are gone
from this one, which also feels like it's down to the age of those involved (a
product, perhaps, of what their life experience has taught them). But as much
as it's missing the magic, it could be this very absence that makes this one
special, and what makes it work on its own terms. It doesn't feel like a gem in
the way the first two do, but I think time will prove it to be equally memorable,
and equally profound.

15/06/13

Went to the BFI for a double bill:
The Act of Killing and White Elephant. At times, The
Act of Killingseems almost
like a fictional satire of genocide power – but it's not, it's a terrifying nightmare
of reality. There's no denying the film's outright power, but I felt throughout
that it could have been more probing. It's only late in the film that it starts
to examine the 'why', and even then it feels like it needed to go further, to
build a fuller psychological portrait of its participants. For instance, when
Anwar begins to awake to the full impact of his crimes and express surprise at
how his victims felt, why didn't Oppenheimer ask him how he thought they felt?
Was Anwar really only realising their fear for the first time? Making men such
as Anwar confront their pasts is a worthwhile enterprise – but something needs
to be got from it. It feels wrong to be overcritical of a film which draws
attention to such barbaric acts in such a powerful way, but at the same time
there is something a little disturbing about the whole enterprise. Not only is
there a lack of real insight (psychological or political), but at times it
feels very constructed (for one thing, the timeline of events is never clear). In
all, a very powerful film, but a problematic one also – but maybe that's okay.
Maybe by being problematic, it causes us to scrutinise it more closely, and thus
engage even further with the issues it raises. White Elephant, meanwhile,
suffered from a slightly undefined narrative trajectory, by which I mean it was
unclear what it was building to (and, indeed, the ending was a weird mix of multiple
ending-syndrome and extreme abruptness). But it was never less than engaging, and
Trapero is a filmmaker who really
knows how to use the camera – and when to cut.

Monday, 10 June 2013

(Click
here to read my general introduction to the 'Films This Week' series of
posts.)

﻿

Signs of Life

02/06/13

Watched Bedlam. It's good, but it
feels like a lesser work somehow. Apart from final shot of Karloff waking up as
he's being walled in, nothing really stands out. Also, the positivity of the
ending doesn't quite ring true – it seems at odds with the unbending pessimism,
the bleakness, that's gone before it (both in the film itself, and in the rest
of Lewton's oeuvre). Death is good, and there is darkness in everyone.

07/06/13

Went to see Signs
of Life, which felt like the kind of small film that I see at EIFF (and
which is then never seen again). It definitely becomes a different kind of film
halfway through, and I think it was the first half I really responded to: the rhythm,
the mundanity, the absurdist humour. But that's not to say the second half
wasn't enjoyable too. The photography is also beautiful throughout, and what a
location! A very strong debut.

08/06/13

Went to see Behind
the Candelabra. Soderbergh's on good form this year (this might be even
better than Side
Effects). I found it quite terrifying – there's something almost vampiric
about Liberace. But there's a lot of fun to it, and by the end it's very
moving: its exploration of power, ego and image never overshadows its simple probing
into human relationships. Michael Douglas is terrific (I'd somehow never taken
in how good he is, or maybe he's just better here?). I'm very pleased to hear
that Soderbergh already has plans to make more TV.

Thursday, 6 June 2013

'Know me!' cried Markheim. 'Who
can do so? My life is but a travesty and slander on myself. I have lived to
belie my nature. All men do; all men are better than this disguise that grows
about and stifles them. You see each dragged away by life, like one whom bravos
have seized and muffled in a cloak. If they had their own control – if you
could see their faces, they would be altogether different, they would shine out
for heroes and saints! I am worse than most; myself is more overlaid; my excuse
is known to me and God. But, had I the time, I could disclose myself' - Robert Louis Stevenson, Markheim

Sunday, 2 June 2013

(Click
here to read my general introduction to the 'Films This Week' series of
posts.)

Isle of the Dead

27/05/13

Watched Isle of the Dead, which
was a fantastically tense meditation on death, fear and paranoia; a study on
the evil that dwells within us all. It's a story about how we take recourse in
superstition to help explain tragedy. There's an increasing tightening of the
screws throughout. Really superb. In the evening I watched, Vicky Christina Barcelona,
which I also enjoyed, if not quite to the same degree.

29/05/13

Watched The Body Snatcher. I
think it's a good adaptation (expansion) of the original story, even if there
are a couple of individual scenes/sequences which have lost their power in the
transition from page to screen. Some of the best moments, though, are original
to the film – the death of the street singer is exceptionally well handled. In
fact, the handling throughout is excellent, the shadowy cinematography perfectly
crafting the required atmosphere. The performances, too, really stood out,
especially Henry Daniell and Karloff (this is the best I've seen Karloff). I
think it's interesting that they chose to singularise the title of the original
story – it has a curious effect upon the way one thinks about the film (I'm
reminded of the Bicycle Thieves/Bicycle Thief discussions). Watching it
so close to the other Lewton films has got me thinking about Lewton as the
auteur of his films. There's something cohesive about them all. He may not have been the (credited)
director, but they all unmistakeably bear his stamp.

01/06/13

Went to see The
Passion of Joan of Arc in a church in Shoreditch, with a live score from
In The Nursery. A combination of delays and a support act meant there was quite
a long (too long a) wait before the film began, but it was worth it. No matter
how many times I see it, it still feels fresh. Today it felt like I was
watching it for the first time all over again – the hounding assault of the
judges was as terrifying as ever. It's a film of quivering lips and flaring nostrils,
a masterpiece built upon gestures and moments. Its slow progression from controlled
exteriors to all hell breaking loose outside worked its magic – never has a
film been so perfectly structured. And, of course, there's the beautiful geometry
of its images. It's exhilarating cinema. The score was excellent too, really
drawing out the drama and excitement of the film, but not to the extent of
wiping out its emotion. I think its shot up to become one of my favourite
scores for the film. The location, while exciting in theory, failed to really
add anything to the experience, though. The church itself wasn't particularly
atmospheric, and while it seemed like a fitting addition to have a dimming stained-glass
window behind the screen, as soon as the film started Joan was all that
mattered (it's not a film during which you can take your eyes off the screen). I
just wanted to be alone (alone with Joan).
These novelty screenings may be all well and good as an excuse to get people
back into watching films on the big screen, but personally I think I'll stick
to the cinema.